Wayne Rooney is the anti-Samson you know the old biblical story, Samson, a ridiculously strong guy, falls in love with a tart, who then finds the secret of his strength, and ruins him for money. Well that secret was his glorious, Fabio-esque locks (well I picture them Fabio-esque in my head). Rooney has said that the secret to his power is, wait for it, his male-pattern baldness. I am not lying:

‘‘It’s coming off my bald patch and that’s helping me score.’’

Ok well, he does go on to say it’s helped his headers, leading to more goals, but i like to think it’s something more than that. So i suppose if you wanted to fell Rooney for the World Cup, just slip some Rogaine into his shampoo. Thankfully, I’m fairly sure Colleen Rooney is above bribing, as she could probably bathe in money if she so wished.

While that was the craziest thing to come out of yesterday’s little conference, there were some other interesting things.

He’s not phased by holding the hopes and dreams of a nation on his shoulders. Well that’s reassuring. Since it’s definitely true.

“I think I’ve had pressure since I started playing for Everton at 16 and for England at 17.”

He’s got his eye on that armband. This is a bit controversial, since we are all well aware that he has a bit of a temper, which is not what one looks for in a captain. but it’s certainly true that he has calmed down a lot in the past couple of seasons. I think maybe in a couple years he could be a quite good captain. He thinks so as well:

“I think I’ve got qualities to be England captain so I hope one day to be able to do that”

He’s not wasting himself. Rooney’s come under fire recently about perhaps playing too much. Fergie was upset about the amount of time he had in the Egypt friendly, but Rooney said yesterday that he’s got his own health in mind too:

“It’s not due to my knee but I have played a lot of games this year and it is about reining myself in during training. I am getting a bit older and wiser now.”

Clever boy. We all know that the number one thing in every England fan’s mind is Rooney’s fitness come June.

Of course this is the era of the internet, so I’d be pretty suprised if it doesn’t come up on the www before to long, if newspapers can’t publish what was said. I can’t imagine it’s that interesting mind.

The FA is convinced that it might give away some tactical secrets (ie “We’ll play 4-4-2 for the first half, then go back to the old formation on 45 minutes”) but knowing the fascination this country has with scandal, its probably more likely they were hoping someone would say something re JT/Bridge or uncover a whole new scandal.

Obviously Fabio doesn’t need this distraction, and hopefully it’ll just go away. I can’t see that, mind, but fingers crossed it does just vanish. Hearing too much about what goes on in the England camp isn’t usually a good thing – as Glenn Hoddle’s World Cup Diary proves. Having said that if it does contain something “newsworthy” I can’t imagine that it’ll stay quiet too long.

I really can’t wait for the World Cup to start so all this kind of nonsense goes away and we can concentrate on you know, the football.

Peter Crouch
Speaking of didn’t impress, we come to Defoe’s Spurs partner, Crouch. Now I say this coming from a place of great love and respect for dear old Crouchinho, but he really had a fairly crap game. He got more chances than Defoe, and managed to waste nearly all of them, sending them anywhere but the goal. I think this is a game Crouchie will want Capello to forget quickly.

Tom Huddlestone
The 23 year old proved he still has a lot of growing up to do. The pressure of the penalty spot proved too much, and he didn’t give Jussi Jaaskelainen much trouble with his tentative, poorly placed shot. He also remained fairly quiet, even after the rest of the Spurs midfield woke up. He certainly has some promise, but he needs to develop as a player more before he can hope for a squad place.

Ledley King
I’m really sorry that King has so many injury issues, if he wasn’t such a liability I think he would have been a regular in the England squad. He had a good game, making effective tackles and marking well. Like I said, if he didn’t get injured every 2 weeks, I think he’d be England’s 3rd best central defender.

Kevin Davies
Kevin Davies is probably my favorite footballer on the Bolton team. While he is often criticized as an old fashioned center forward, I think he can perform much more than that. He has an incredible work rate, great ball skills and is very unselfish. Quite honestly I think he can play the Emile Heskey role better than Heskey himself at the moment, but his age (he’ll be 33 in March) will not do him any favours. Someone commented on 606 that it is a travesty he hasn’t gotten an England cap, while I agree, I doubt it’s going to change.

As much as I would have liked to include more Bolton players in that, I don’t think it’s realistic, and certainly not on current form. I would also like to note that had Gary Cahill been playing he would have been on this list, but he has suffered a rather bad blood clot, which has pretty much dashed his World Cup chances. Capello was given a bit to think about from this game. Two of his star strikers underperformed, while someone not even on the fringes of the squad played well. In the end I don’t think it will really change his call up preferences, but wouldn’t it be interesting if a Bolton player got the call up for the Egypt friendly? Maybe I only think that because I’m a Bolton fan. Probably.

I’m sure you’ve heard of Portsmouth’s troubles this season, they’ve paid their players (as well as the rest of the Portsmouth staff) late three times, they’ve had two takeovers in the last year, and now they aren’t allowed to buy any players in the transfer window. They’ve won just 4 times this season, and sit dead bottom of the table with 14 points from 20 games. It’s fair to say that the sun has not been shining on the South Coast recently.

It now looks like David James will almost certainly complete the loan deal with Stoke. So that’s it I guess, one of England’s most loyal players has chosen his country over his club. I’m fairly sure if I was David James I would’ve done the same thing. Portsmouth’s a sunken ship at this point, they will be going down to the Championship, bar a miracle, and I doubt they will be promoted again for a while. His days are numbered, and he’s clearly a man who wants to be plying at the top level, both internationally and at club level for as long as possible. So what do you think, should David James have chosen club or country?

Obviously this leaves plenty of room for a deluge of unofficial ones, and re-releases of the old ones, but I think its quite sad really. Alright most football singles are absolutely dreadful, but its part of the show. The World Cup is a bit of a festival, and you want music to soundtrack that.

I realise its all apart of the all new Super Serious England, and you can’t argue with the results so far, but still, its just a bit of fun (as shown, or otherwise, below)

Besides, when we’ve had a half-decent song to soundtrack the team – World In Motion, Three Lions etc, we’ve done quite well (semi-finals in both of those). So I’m not sure where not having one leaves us. Although the last time we didn’t have one was, er, 1966. I think we did alright that year.

Anyway, in mild protest, here’s some of the best and worst Football Songs that have soundtracked the England Team.

New Order – World In Motion

The Daddy. Joy Division purists might have balked, but its undeniably a slice of pop genius, with Chris Waddle putting his vocal chords to good use and John Barnes rapping away (something, he can still do). I still ritulistically listen to this before England games, whether friendly, qualifier or tournament.

The Lightning Seeds with Skinner and Baddiel – Three Lions

This one absolutely captured the mood of a nation. We’d had a bad couple of years, what with not qualifying for the 1994 World Cup, and boldly the song opens with proclaimations from pundits about how rubbish we are. But there was a real sense of optimism as we hosted Euro 96, that we could do well and that is what the song exemplifies. Rememering all the times we pulled out the stops against the odds, its all a call to optimism, despite Thirty Years of Hurt.

The 1970 World Cup Squad – Back Home

This is the one that started it all. And its a bit rubbish. But its funny listening to just how conservative it sounds now.

Bell & Spurling – Sven Sven Sven

No released for a tournament, but rushed out after we beat Germany 5-1. Its bizzare, and the nadir of football songs. “He’s a lovely geezer, but don’t forget he’s from Sweeeeeeden”. The commentary clips from the time are interesting though – “Gerrard, the future of England football”.

Fat Les – Vindaloo

Keith Allen – now best known as Lily’s dad – came back to football songs with this France 98 effort, which now is best remembered for a video parodying the then-ubiquitous Bitter Sweet Symphony video. It sounds a bit yobbish now, but i remember loving it at the time.

Ant and Dec – On the Ball

Yeah, quite forgettable, with a somewhat by the numbers Player-X-to-Player-Y lyric. It would like to be Three Lions, but its a bit bobbins really. Maybe we dodged a bullet afterall.

This is what football looked like in 1872.

“We are, as always, willing to engage in open dialogue with our English counterparts…Bring it on.”

I think that it would be great to bring back a match with such historical significance, especially seeing as the two teams haven’t played each other for nearly 11 years. England-Scotland was the first (official) international football match ever played, all the way back in 1872 (it ended 0-0 if you were wondering). To read on up, pop over to the little article the BBC has on it. England went on to play Scotland a further 109 times, winning 45 of these matches and losing 41. However the infamous football hooliganism drew the annual matches to a halt in 1984, the two sides only faced each other intermittently after that.

Well I think it’s safe to say that hooliganism is pretty firmly in the past, I have never, ever felt unsafe at a football match, and I’ve walked through a sea of Scousers proudly wearing my Bolton scarf. It’s time to bring these old games back, it’s nice to have traditions like these, and besides, England fans have to have something to pin their hopes on other than the World Cup.

The English FA are not keen on the idea of losing Fabio Capello any time soon. There have been rumours floating around that Capello might be bidding us arrivederci once World Cup 2010 is done, with Roy Hodgson touted as the man to fill his fine Italian shoes, but FA chief exec Ian Watmore says no:

“Reports linking Roy Hodgson or any manager with the England job post the World Cup are just not true,” Watmore said. “We expect Fabio Capello to remain in the post for the duration of his contract, which runs through to the summer of 2012. Fabio Capello has also made it clear that he expects to continue in the role after the World Cup and throughout the Euro 2012 campaign.”

Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing Hodgson in charge of England at all. But only after Capello wins us the World Cup this summer.

I know this England team still has certain weaknesses (Glen Johnson’s knee injury has me worried about our options at rightback again) but I’m still thrilled that we look like a team with a plan.

Wayne Rooney looks lethal in an England shirt, Gerrard and Lampard can play together, and we’ve got pacy options down the wing. Masssive massive thumbs up for Fabio Capello and an excellent World Cup qualification campaign the undoubted highlight. Happy days.

Here’s hoping 2010 is just as impressive, and that we put in a good showing at a certain little tournament in South Africa.

The FIFA end of year gala was last night in Zurich, with plenty of awards handed out to the cream of world football. Including: the FIFA/FIFPRO World XI, voted for by the world’s professional footballers:

Iker Casillas (Real Madrid), John Terry (Chelsea), Nemanja Vidic (Man Utd), Patrice Evra (Man Utd), Dani Alves (Barcelona), Xavi (Barcelona), Andres Iniesta (Barcelona), Steven Gerrard (Liverpool), Lionel Messi (Barcelona), Cristiano Ronaldo (Real Madrid), Fernando Torres (Liverpool).

Congratulations to John Terry and Steven Gerrard, the two England players who made the XI. England was the second most represented nation, behind Spain who had [counts quickly] four players in there.

Unsurprisingly, the 2009 FIFA World Player of the Year award went to Leo Messi. All national team captains and coaches got to vote for their top three, and FIFA rather helpfully published the ballots in PDF format afterwards. Read on to find out who Fabio Capello and John Terry voted for:
Fabio Capello voted: #1 Leo Messi, #2 Fernando Torres, #3 Gigi Buffon.
John Terry voted: #1 Didier Drogba, #2 Michael Ballack, #3 Andres Iniesta

Think there’s may be just a little bit of Chelsea bias going on with Terry’s votes there. Don’t you?

The other England related highlight of the night was the late Sir Bobby Robson receiving the FIFA Fair Play Award. Here’s what FIFA.com had to say:

The most emotional moment of the ceremony came when the winner of the FIFA Fair Play Award was announced. Recognised for his sterling contribution to the spirit of the game throughout a distinguished career, the award went to legendary English player and coach Sir Bobby Robson, who died in July this year and was widely admired for his sportsmanship on and off the pitch. Collecting the award from UEFA vice-president Senes Erzic was Sir Bobby’s wife Elsie Robson.

Here’s video of the minute of respect for Sir Bobby Robson before the Netherlands vs England friendly in Amsterdam in August.

I’m not sure, which is more disturbing: That George Lopez just destroyed the stereotype of Mexican-Americans all being huge soccer fans, or that David Beckham – Lopez’ guest on Lopez Tonight – didn’t correct his mistake.

Wasn’t just a slip of the tongue from Lopez either, as the phrase “three-time world cup winner David Beckham” is repeated on the TBS Lope Tonight blog. Seems that one of two things has happened. Either a) There’s been some confusion about Beckham appearing in (as opposed to actually winning) three World Cups, or b) Beckham has been telling some porky pies to the Lopez Tonight researchers. Because who wants to be introduced as “one time MLS Cup-runner up David Beckham”?

Here are the other two segments of Beckham on the show: